The Dragon Prince's Consort

Forty-Five

Holding a heavy kai coin in her fingers, Fang stared at herself in the huge gilded mirror and carefully pressed it to the space between her eyebrows. Leaning over the vanity she let the coin drop into her hand and looked up, smiling at the perfect imprint of the rampant beast painted in gold and transferred to her skin. "What do you think?"

Valen leaned close, tipping her chin up with his good hand and turning her head. He had found her experimenting when he'd come back from his ride with Benna, and for the last half-hour he'd been sitting with her at her dressing-table watching her play around with red, gold, white and black. "I like it, but it needs something else..." He turned back to the vanity and looked over the collection of tiny glass pots and silver-handled brushes. "Hngh," he picked up the smallest brush and touched the fine hairs into a pot of red pigment, then made a tiny dot on the beast's head. "There, now he has an eye."

Fang turned to see, and grinned at the little creature painted on her forehead. "Yes, that's perfect!" She took the brush from him, cleaned it, and set it back in its case with the others. Picking a thicker brush, she mixed the red pigment with some teaflower oil and made a paste to paint on her lips, drawing them just a little bit fuller than normal and giving herself a rich, plush pout. "How's this?" she asked after tapping some more powder on to set the color.

"Hmm..." Valen sat back to look at the whole effect, then leaned in again to examine more closely. Fang watched his eyes and ears, judging his interest by how wide or narrow his pupils went and how high his ears rose. When his ears lay relaxed against his head and his pupils fattened Fang knew he liked it. "I'm more used to gold or black, but red always looks good on you. It's going to look really good with your robes."

Fang glanced to the enormous wrapped package lying on their bed – her gown, ordered weeks ago and finally delivered, could easily be considered Arban's best work and would probably be the most talked-about piece of clothing in the Empire. Made from white silk, unusual for Drass clothes by tradition, it sported trailing sleeves and a train half-again as long as the gown itself; gold brocade set with Dreenai pearls and white sapphires transformed the outer robe into a dazzling yet elegant display of Drassian history, the rampant beast shimmering along the bottom hem and the various seals of the Empire rising up the back in a column like Drass calligraphy. It looks like a wedding dress, Fang had remarked upon seeing it, baffled that she would be wearing something so mindbogglingly gorgeous; truthfully, it was the wedding dress to end all wedding dresses in that she would be wearing it when Valen declared her, in front of his family and millions of watching Drass and humans, his Lady Consort. Aisana will be eating her hearts out when she sees it.

Since the incident with Tias, life in the palace had been relatively quiet save for the constant organized chaos of preparing for the Federation Envoy's reception. As far as she could tell, Madame Chatterjee had gone back to her reserved suite in Kitsara ready to fight for Valen's colony – evidently Fang's suggestion that he speak to the envoy as he would her had gone well, and Fang hadn't missed the bright color rising in Remitha's cheeks the longer Valen held eye contact and gave the impression that he was subtly seducing her. The older woman – and Fang knew Valen preferred women older than himself – had responded just as Fang thought she would, fidgeting with her clothes and fumbling her words. She'd been slightly embarrassed when Fang entered the conference room, as if she'd been entertaining some ideas best left untried.

"I have something else for you," Valen's voice drew Fang out of her thoughts suddenly. "I didn't want to mention it until it was done, but it arrived last night and I'd like to see what you think of it."

Fang smiled. "Is it more jewelry?" Though new clothes still arrived regularly, her collection of necklaces, rings, earrings, chains, chokers, bangles, hair accessories and more was already enormous and she'd lost track of just how much she owned in spite of the itemized catalog with each piece numbered and stored with its related parts. And that didn't even begin to compare to her collections of soaps, perfumes, hair oils, scented skin creams and cosmetics – what Valen wasn't buying for her arrived in decorated boxes from vendors all around Kitsara, full-size samples of every luxury beauty product made in the port city. Once word had gotten around about the pint-size Dragon Prince's female companion, it seemed the whole Empire was vying for her favor.